


I Got You (Don't Worry)

by Whooooooops



Series: All my friends are cacti [2]
Category: Danger Days: The True Lives of the Fabulous Killjoys - My Chemical Romance (Album), The True Lives of the Fabulous Killjoys (Comic)
Genre: Character Death, Death in Childbirth, Disabled Character, LGBTQ Themes, Major Illness, Physical Disability, Sibling Love
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-15
Updated: 2020-08-31
Packaged: 2021-03-06 00:07:42
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 10
Words: 4,317
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25914109
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Whooooooops/pseuds/Whooooooops
Summary: This is basically a prequel fic to I'm The Only Friend That Makes You Cry
Relationships: Agent Cherri Cola/Dr. Death Defying (Danger Days), Original Female Character & Original Female Character
Series: All my friends are cacti [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1880656
Comments: 4
Kudos: 2





	1. Chapter 1

Any time during the analog wars was a terrible time to have children. In the city it gets taken from you because of even the slightest imperfection. The slums were dirty and the mortality rate was high. The desert was heavily radiated so the babies often died before they were born. Overall not good for anyone. That didn't stop people though. It had to be quick, S/C/A/R/E/C/R/O/W patrols were constant. If they're not in the city, they either need to take it there or get rid of it. There are no other options. At least the kid was okay. It was short, I happened almost too fast. Kotik lied limp on the ground. The baby's screaming. Lana looks terrified, "M-Mom?" she tries shaking her gently, "Mom, wake up." She keeps trying for a few more minutes before giving up and wrapping the baby in her blanket. "Shh, Shh, why are we crying?" Kotik was left lying on the dirty ground.

Lana was 14. Hardly old enough to take care of herself. What's she gonna do with a baby? What happens if she gets ghosted or drac-ed? What’s gonna happen to her? The baby interrupts her thoughts and reaches up at her, cooing. Lana looks down at her, “Hey, kiddo,” She moves her arms around, trying to figure out how to do all that. Lana smiles softly, “Those are your arms, baby.” she coos again and promptly falls asleep. The baby's small with bright green eyes and quite a lot of hair. It's colorless right now, maybe she'll be able to make the color out later. She has a round face just like her mother. She looked strikingly similar to Lana, minus eye color. Lana's not even sure if she really _was_ Kotik's child, or just some kid she found on the street. Lana looks around, her icy blue eyes filled with tears. She needed to get out of there.

The baby- she's chosen the name Lyudmilla for her -Is calm. It's like she knows what happened. She heads upstairs, trying her best to hide Lyudmilla. The C/R/O/W/S see her and follow her. She runs. She runs as fast as her legs can carry her. She runs for what feels like hours. She finds a boulder and sinks down to sit against it, starting to cry. She doesn't have much time to mourn, but she can't keep running. Why does it have to be this way?! She hated it in the slums, why wouldn’t she listen to her?! She’d still be here if they would’ve just stayed in the city, but she was apparently ‘too young to know.’ Here she is in the desert, her mom just died, she doesn't have money or food, it's just her and Lyudmilla. She cries out in anguish. The baby wakes up at that and starts to fuss. Lana calms herself a bit, "Shh, Shh, it's okay, you're okay, I got you."


	2. Chapter two

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Lana's trying her best to be a parent

Parenting is hard. Harder than Lana could've ever imagined. She's barely come out of childhood herself and bam now there's another being she's responsible for. She found a small shed-like thing that her and Lyudmilla have been living in since they got out into the desert. It's about eight by eight feet made out of wood. It looks like it's been abandoned for a while, it's a wonder no one lived there. Fortunately, Lyudmilla's been happier than most babies. She still cries, but she's not screaming all the time. She's currently sleeping after a late-night feeding. The baby food's expensive, but she's sneaky. Baby supplies are hard to come across, she just got the food and two onesies and that's it. She's probably gonna get caught, but she'll cross that bridge when she gets to it. Until then she'll just keep yoinking.

The zones are harder and hotter than Lana imagined. She's too young for this. No one's ever really ready for the desert, are they? She's given up on sleeping that night. She had a nightmare at the beginning and she doesn't wanna risk it. She opts holds Lyudmilla. Lyudmilla wakes up, doing a little baby stretch. Lyudmilla's still discovering the fact that she has limbs. She's about six months old now. Lana smiles softly, "Hi, beautiful. Did you have a good nap?" she coos and reaches up at her. "You're sister's not feeling good. You're helpin' a lot, baby." She coos, smiling a bit. Lana holds her close, "I love you so much." She stands her up on her lap, I promise to protect you forever and always." She leans forward and tries to hug her. Lana melts at that, "I love you, Lyudmilla."

Yeah, parenting is hard, but it needs to be done. But times like this that are okay. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I was bored I wanted to write some more


	3. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> This is the start of a few chapters in which bad stuff happens

After a few years, Lana's kinda gotten used to the whole parent thing. Lyudmilla's just starting to waddle around. The shack's fine, but sooner or later they'll need to find another place. Despite only knowing a few words, Lyudmilla's a very talkative child. (Her first word was puppy. The puppy was a lizard.) She can barely go five minutes off of Lana's neck. Lana's scared. Now that she can move around and communicate, what happens if she finds herself in the wrong hands? She shouldn't have to worry, though, hence the previous line. Lyudmilla's not going anywhere. They have each other and nothing else, but that's all you really need.

Lyudmilla starts crying out of nowhere one day. Lana sighs and goes over, "What's the matter, Newt?" Lana's been thinking of aliases for a while, The jury's still out on her own, but Newt sounded great for Lyudmilla. She shakes her head and makes grabby hands for her, "Up!" she sobs. Lana picks her up, "Can you tell me why you're upset, baby?" She hugs her around the neck, "Ow," she sobs. Lana furrows her brows, "What hurts?" She points to her head. She sighs and puts her down, "Drink some water, Newt." She helps her drink it. (Do you seriously trust a toddler to hold a regular-sized water bottle?) She only drinks a little bit before sobbing harder. Lana puts the water bottle down, "What's the matter?" "H-hurt." She sighs, "Show me where it hurts." Lyudmilla shakes her head. Lana sighs and lays down on their shared cot, "Let's take a little nap, shall we?" The child crawls on top of her and falls asleep on her chest.

~

The next day, Lana gets up early to write a quick note, then picks Lyudmilla up. She heads out, looking for Show Pony. She has a question for Dr D. D knows just about everything about the zones, maybe he can tell her if there's any makeshift clinics anywhere nearby. Lyudmilla wakes up after about half an hour of walking. She makes a small whimper, causing Lana to look over, "Good morning, Sunshine." "H-hurt." She's getting worried, "I know, Newt. I'm tryna' make you feel better."

She finds Show Pony on their way back to the station, "H-hey, wait!" Lana calls. Pony looks over, "What's up?" She takes the letter out of her pocket, "Could you give this to Dr D?" she hands it to them, "Sure thing, motorbaby." She nods in gratitude and starts home, walking towards a pink and orange sunset.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> There's an explanation go have fun. Also remember what I said about an update schedule neither do I don't mind that.


	4. Chapter 4

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> This where it goes down

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I've been doing my research, these are real polio symptoms

Pony gets sent out early the next day. He gets sent out with a reply to Lana. Pony knocks on the door early that morning. This scares Lana. She lays Lyudmilla down and goes to open the door. "You're the kid that asked about hospitals around, right?" she nods. Pony digs around in their bag for a minute before they pull out a letter, "When you have the chance, Dr D wants to see you." She nods, "Thank you so much." Pony smiles, "Don't be. Keep an eye on that sand pup over there." They gesture to Lyudmilla. "I will." Pony leaves.

Lyudmilla wakes up after a bit. She looks up, "Nana." She makes grabby hands asking to be picked up. Lana picks her up and holds her, "Do you feel any better?" She shakes her head "Hurt." she says into her. "What hurts today?" She looks up at her, "Head an' neck an' arms." Lana sighs, "Today we're gonna go see someone who might be able to make you feel better." Lyudmilla looks up and cocks her head, "Who?" Lana thinks for a moment. This kid pro'lly has no clue who Dr D is. "Just someone who wants to help." Lyudmilla's beginning to look unwell. Her face is read and she can hardly move her limbs. She buries her face into Lana's shoulder, "No feel good." Lana sits on the cot, "I know, kiddo. We're gonna go look for that guy, why don't you take a little nap on the way there?" Lyudmilla nods and closes her eyes.

~

They get to the radio shack in about three hours, Lyudmilla slept the whole time. She ducks and walks in, "Dr D?" He rolls out, "Hey there, you're Lana, right?" She nods, "Yes sir." He nods as well, "You said you needed a doctor. I'm not super good at any medical things, but I still wanna take a look at the kid to see if it's something anyone in the zones can treat." She looks up suddenly, surprised at the thought of Lyudmilla not getting better. "U-uh, I didn't get a whole lot out of her, but from what I gathered, she has a headache and sore throat. She looks really stiff as well." The older man nods, "How old is she?" Lana looks down at the sleeping child, "About two." Dr D's getting worried as well, "Does she have a temperature?" Lana freezes. She never thought about that, "I-I don't know," her eyes get misty, she's getting really overwhelmed. "That's alright, kid," D says, "I think we have a thermometer somewhere..." he disappears into a different room for a minute. Sure enough, he does have a thermometer."

Her temperature's 102 degrees (Fahrenheit.) Dr D sighs, "There's a hospital in zone 03, the most they can probably do is ease the pain. You'll just have to wait it out." Lana nods, "Of course, thank you so much," Dr D looks at Lyudmilla, who woke up for about five minutes throughout that whole thing, "Don't thank me, let me know when she gets better." Lana knew the chances were slim, but she didn't wanna believe it.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I love writing little kids y'all can fight me.


	5. Chapter 5

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Lana is very overwhelmed.

It all happened so fast. The doctors couldn't really do anything, they tried, but in the end, they just sent them home with some medicine. Dr D helped her pay for it, Lana's bottom carbon only covered about a third of it, so she was grateful for that. She's confused as to how Lyudmilla even got it. Polio was cured a long time ago, right? Lana forgot about the fact that when you're in the slums there aren't really people giving vaccinations. She should've gone to the city. She sits on the cot next to a sleeping Lyudmilla. She moves some hair from her face and in doing so learns her fever's gone down, but only a little bit. She pulls her onto her lap and holds her close. "I love you, Newt." she kisses her head, "I'm not leaving this bed until you're better, I promise you." 

The child stirs and buries her face into Lana's chest, "Nana," she mumbles. Lana looks down, "Hey, sunshine." She looks down at her, "How're you feeling today, love?" Lyudmilla looks up at her, "Hurt. Wan' no hurt." Lana lays her down, "I know, baby," she gets her some medicine and quickly gives it to her. She picks her up and lays down on the cot, holding her against her chest, "Wan' Nana." Lana closes her eyes, "I'm right here, baby. I'm not leaving any time soon." She tries to curl up, but she can't really move at the moment, "Why hurt?" She looks down at the younger girl and sighs, "The doctors said you're really sick, but they're trying to make you better. That's why we have the medicine." The child fell asleep before she finished the sentence. 

Lana lays with her for an undeterminable amount of time, but she didn't mind. All she did was pray that the child on top of her would eventually wake up.


	6. Chapter 6

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Lyudmilla can stay awake for longer now which is kind of a plus

It's been a couple of weeks since they got back from the hospital. Lyudmilla's been falling in and out of sleep that entire time. Lana's left the shack a couple of times for food and to look for a new base, and when she did she let Show Pony know so if she were to get ghosted while she was gone, they knew to go get the child. She's honestly not sure if Lyudmilla's getting better or not. She left a couple of days ago, for now, she's laying with the child. Lyudmilla stirs a bit and buries her face into Lana's chest, "Nana." Lana looks down, "Good morning, Newt." It wasn't morning, but she didn't know really what to say. She tilts the younger one's face up a bit and puts a hand on her forehead. The fever's thankfully gone down. "How're you feeling, baby?" Lyudmilla snuggles her, "Sleepy." Lana's relieved at that, "Go back to sleep then," she shakes her hand, "Wan' snuggle." She nods and sits up, "Of course, Newt."

"Does anything hurt?" Lyudmilla looks up at her, "Head." Lana gently lays the child down and gets her a water bottle. Lyudmilla looks up at her, "No drink." The older girl sits next to her, "It'll make your head feel better." She helps her drink it. She pulls the water bottle away after a couple of minutes, "Do you want more or are you done?" Lyudmilla leans on her, "No more." She nods, "Okay." she holds her close. Lana's been thinking about teaching her Russian, just for her mom's sake. She taught Lana, now Lana feels like she owes it to her. Maybe she should wait until Lyudmilla can speak in sentences first, though. "Nana?" Lyudmilla looks up at her, "Why I no feel good?"

There are many ways Lana can go about this. She thinks for a moment, "I'll tell you when you're older." Lyudmilla pouts a bit. "Where go?" Lana cocks her head, "What do you mean?" The child looks up at her, "You no there yest'day." Lana sighs, "I was gettin' some food, kiddo. I'm sorry if I scared you." She hugs Lana around the neck, "Thought you no come home." Lana holds Lyudmilla close, "I'd never leave you like that, baby. I promise." The small one refuses to let go, "No more leave." Lana smiles softly, "I won't, Newt."


	7. Chapter 7

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which our team finds a new base

It's been about a week and a half since the sickness and Lyudmilla's almost fully recovered. They went to Dr. D's one more time per his request, it was when they learned Lyudmilla lost one of her legs. Lana's trying to be optimistic, hoping it's just temporary. She wakes up early the next day and looks around. This shack isn't gonna work for much longer. She moves Lyudmilla and looks for her map that she paid too much for at Tommy Chow Mein's. There is ultimately no useful information in there. Lana sighs and gently wakes the young one up, "Newt, baby," Lyudmilla stirs, "Hi, Nana," The older one starts packing essentials, "Were gonna look for a new place today, m'kay?" Lyudmilla looks up at her, "But you say no leave!" The older girl puts her backpack on, "I'm taking you with me, kiddo." She picks her up and gets going.

She walks for hours, Lyudmilla's long asleep, and Lana's on the verge of passing out as well. She finds a boulder and sits against it, closing her eyes. Her mind begins to wander. She's been thinking about it for a while, what if she went to the city instead of the desert? Lana would no doubt be 'Reeducated' by now, but Lyudmilla would be safe. She wouldn't have gotten sick, she'd be able to walk... No... no, the city would be worse. Who is she convincing by saying that? She looks down at Lyudmilla, she looked so much like their mom. She was the last piece of her she had left, she's not letting her leave her. "Someday, Newt. Someday we won't be running. We'll see that day, I promise." She sighs and leans her head back, falling into a dreamless sleep.

~

After three long days of searching and sleeping on the sand, Lana finally found an old vacant gas station. It was small, and the sign fell off years ago, but it wasn't a shack so it was perfect in Lana's book. She gently wakes Lyudmilla up, "Hey, I found something." The child slowly wakes up, "Why wake up?" Lana laughs slightly, "Don't you wanna look around?" Lyudmilla nods and nuzzles her neck. From the looks of it, some killjoys have lived there before. Lana finds a mattress and a cot in the back room. The mattress was small, flat, and dirty, but it was the first actual bed Lana had in years. Needless to say, she was excited. There was also a six-foot by six-foot supply closet. She decided that the closet would be Lyudmilla's room when she gets older. Lana grins, "We made it, Newt."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> expect a long timeskip in the next chapter


	8. Chapter 8

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A very long timeskip to some very bad things

Our pair's been living in their gas station for a couple of years, Lana's actually becoming a killjoy, her name's Agent After, she dyed her hair and everything. (She did it when Lyudmilla was younger, she was amused by that.) Lyudmilla's gone out on a few supply runs and drac patrols, but Lyudmillla's young, Agent wants her to 1) stay safe and 2) keep her innocence. Lyudmilla doesn't know that, though. She's ten! She can go out and shoot dracs just fine! This is bull (Agent doesn't let her swear, which is also bull.) "Agent-" Lyudmilla starts. Agent doesn't even need to let her finish, "No." She groans, "Why not? I wanna be a killjoy." Agent sighs, "We've been over this, you're a child, you can come with me one of these days, but not today." Lyudmilla sighs, she gets the same answer every time, but she's not gonna stop asking.

Agent stands, "I'm gonna head out, hold down the for while I'm gone." Lyudmilla nods and sighs, "Agent?" she looks over. "I love you," Agent sighs, "I love you too, kid." She leaves. Lyudmilla curls up. She hates being alone. Nothing bad has happened when she was alone yet, but that doesn't say it never will. Agent says it's safer at home, she doesn't believe that, though. If you go out, you can actually run away if a cloud shows up, but if you're at your base, they could block the door and you that's probably the end of you. Agent won't listen to her, though. She loves her, no doubt, but she desperately wants to get her point across to her.

~

It's been a few hours since Agent left. Lyudmilla got bored so she opted to listen to the radio. It's nothing too much, just a small portable radio, but she loved it. She loved the music Dr D played, she loved hearing the news, and just about every night to let her stay up so she could listen to Cherri's Poetry Corner. She seldom let her, but sometimes she'll sit outside Agent's door to listen. Dr D's reading the traffic report. "Bad news, motorbabies," Lyudmilla perks up, "The killjoy Agent After went and got herself ghosted-" it takes Lyudmilla a little bit to process what she just heard. She slams the off button and puts her head in her hands. She's immeadiately flooded with thoughts like "I should've kept her from going. Maybe I should've gone with her," She's overwhelmed with those thoughts, she doesn't know what to do, she eventually decides to curl up and just sob.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Character arc time! things are finally gonna start coming together


	9. Chapter 9

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Lyudmilla becomes Checker

Lyudmilla couldn't stay there. She tried, but she ultimately decided that it would be safer for her to keep moving. She packed up the radio, some food, a couple of carbons, and a blanket. She's really gonna miss this place, but she ultimately needs to stay safe (although she doesn't know why anymore.) She heads out when the sun starts to rise. She's been crying for hours, but as much as she'd like to stay and mourn, the dracs would be sent out soon, maybe a couple of killjoys would come to raid it and she really didn't wanna deal with that. 

She's out for a few hours before her crutch snaps. She lets out a little yelp when she falls. She looks down at the broken pieces in her hands and groans. She has to crawl now, apparently. The sun is high in the sky when she stops at a rock to eat. She took five cans of Power Pup, she usually only ate about half a can, but she's still debating whether or not she needs it. That internal debate is short-lived, though. She decides that she wants it. She hadn't eaten since yesterday morning. She ends up eating all of it, she never liked Power Pup but at this point, she was in no place to be picky. She decided she'd eat every other day. She had a few carbons, but she'd eventually need more food. Most of the stuff she had wasn't necessary. There'd be some killjoys who need what she has no doubt. She decided she'd sell them.

She continued crawling after lunch. The sand was scorching but 1) she couldn't find Route Guano and 2) it'd be too dangerous for her to go on there anyway (Killjoys weren't known to be the safest drivers.) The sun was starting to go down, slowly lowering the intensity of the dry heat of the desert. She was grateful for that. The temperature changed dramatically at night, though. It went from 118 degrees to 38 as soon as the sun went down. She sat at the bottom of a small mesa and took her blanket out. She started to cry. It'd only been a day and the desert was already wearing on her. She wanted her sister. All she could do now was pretend Lana was there to hold her.


	10. Chapter 10

Lyudmilla's gotten used to the desert. Not to say she wasn't already used to it, but now she knows the reality of it. She sold, begged for, and stole, she's been getting pretty good at not getting caught. People don't see her as a threat. She sold her blanket and radio to buy new clothes. She got a white button-down shirt and black jeans, as well as a pair of suspenders with a black and green checkerboard pattern for color. She didn't really feel like a newt anymore, she wanted a new name, one that made her sound older. She decided on Checker. Besides the suspenders, she has nothing to her name, so that's pretty much all she could do.

She wakes up when the sun rises. She set up camp behind a rock, it's not the most comfortable thing in the world, but it's better than nothing. She heard about a neutral village in the next zone, she wants to try to get over there by sundown. People have been saying there's a store that has - get this - real food. It's only canned corn and the like, but if it's not Power Pup, people are gonna fight for it. The morning's the best time to run, it's not unbearably hot yet, Dracs aren't out yet, and the bugs are still making noise. It doesn't last long, though. after about an hour it started getting hot. Today feels like it's gonna be really hot, but what else is new?

Checker's dusty, tired, and hungry. She has about ten carbons which will get her a can of corn if she's lucky. She gets there just as the store's closing. She spent all day basically gathering dust for nothing. The sun's going down, she sighs and goes to look for an alley or something to sleep in. She sits against the wall behind the store and eats quickly. She decides to leave soon after that, though on account of she saw a rat and she's not about to deal with it. She crawls around for quite a while, getting a few weird looks from some of the people who live in the town. She comes across a van. She looks around to see if the owner was near. She then pulls herself up, leaning on the hood so she can get a better view of the town. 

"I'll give you a warning, whoever you are." A hard male voice says. Checker looks up and freezes. The man's tone changes, "Hey, why're you touching my car?" Checker's panicking, "I-I'm sorry... I was... I-I just needed something to hold onto." There are two men in front of her. "Why don't you come over here?" The second man asks. She limps over, keeping her hands on the hood. "Let go of the car for me," She sighs. She tries to take a step and falls. "Where are your parents?" She looks down. She's never really thought about that. She had Lana and she never said anything about her parents. She just assumed all that was normal. "Wh-what's it to you?" The men look at each other, "I'm Cherri Cola, this is Dr. D. Can you stand?" Checker struggles with her answer. "What's your name?" Dr. D asks, "Checker..." He nods, Would you wanna come home with us, at least for the night?" She thinks for a moment. These are the radio guys, they seemed like decent people. She nods and looks down, "I-I'd like that." Cherri picks her up and sets her in the van. She's asleep within fifteen minutes.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> It's done! lmk if you want any more Checker content!

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks for reading! Kudos and Comments are greatly appreciated.


End file.
